Summer Slips Away

Despite the unseasonally warm weather recently, due perhaps to global warming, summer 2023 is slipping away never to return. Already that slant of warm afternoon light is showing a season change is coming, and schools are back, and later this month (26th September), the autumn equinox is here, and the second harvest, this time of corn, beans, apples and squashes.

Since my accident two years six months ago, I am growing stronger again and don’t have to pre-plan things quite so much. Mentally, my skills are returning and my brain is no longer having to focus quite so much on healing and regaining confidence. I keep trying things that push me a little out of my comfort zone, and each time I succeed, I feel more confident. The pain is less too, most of the time.

So for me now, September feels like a new start, even though I no longer teach. Some of the groups I belong to are starting up again, and I am excited to meet up with new friends I am making them, while still cherishing old friends.

We are starting to tidy the garden for winter and plant some bulbs. I am still sad that gardening is so very hard for me. I can do a lot sitting in a chair but if I try anything standing, I have to sit down fairly often. But at least I can easily get into my shed, although I can’t fetch anything out of it!

Apart from using my walker or my stick, and needing my grab bars and handrails, I am more or less back to my old self, and can take independent steps when I feel safe, though never outside (trip hazards!). Caution is still required because of Covid, but I am actively looking to lead poetry workshops and give readings now. I much prefer face to face. I am looking forward to reading in Shrewsbury next month, a 10 minute slot at the launch of Festival in a Book Anthology, edited by force-for-good Liz Lefroy, and meeting up with some poetry friends from that area.

There are a few exciting publications in the pipeline that must stay secret for now, but I am feeling happy and optimistic for the future.

Here’s a poem by John Clare to remind you to take note of the little things, simple pleasures of the change of seasons.

Autumn

I love the fitful gust that shakes

  The casement all the day,

And from the mossy elm tree takes

  The faded leaf away,

Twirling it by the window pane

With thousand others down the lane.

I love to see the shaking twig

  Dance till the shut of eve,

The sparrow on the cottage rig

  Whose chirp would make believe

That spring was just now flirting by

In summer’s lap with flowers to lie.

I love to see the cottage smoke

  Curl upwards through the naked trees;

The pigeons nestled round the cote

   On dull November days like these;

The cock upon the dunghill crowing;

The mill sails on the heath agoing.

The feather from the raven’s breast

   Falls on the stubble lea;

The acorns near the old crow’s nest

   Fall pattering down the tree

The grunting pigs that wait for all

Scramble and hurry where they fall.

John Clare, 1793 – 1864